Crossing the Balkans
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It’s been 3 weeks since we left the EU, and therefore since I last updated this blog. So whilst I sit here sipping a Greek/rocket fuel Coffee at a beach bar in northwestern Greece, and I overlook a calm Ionian Sea, with Corfu only a few km away across the still waters, let me bring you up to speed on where we have been. On the rollercoaster of a ride we’ve had across the non-EU Balkan states since we crossed the border from Croatia and into a very different world to what we were used to.
We crossed into Bosnia on a sunny afternoon and made our way east to a little park up by a river under the trees. Ellen went to test the river out, walking down the handy steps next to the creaking, rusted diving tower that stood on its banks. She didn’t last long, as she found it was absolutely freezing cold! We would discover later on that almost all the rivers in Bosnia are pretty cold! Not to mention, also pretty dirty.
That last point was a growing theme across the Balkan states in fairness. An ever growing presence of litter piled up like you’ve never seen along the roadsides. That and the stray dogs and odd stray cat.
The next day we needed to get some signal for a meeting and with a bit of a lack of direction and decision fatigue, we ended up heading north a bit into a rolling plain. Pockmarked with sink holes and the odd mine/bomb hole, the landscape was scarred and broken. This was the old Republic Srpksa. A name known to those who remember or at least have learned about the Bosnian war of the 90’s. This was the pro Serb breakaway state that had been mostly responsible for the war crimes committed against the Bosnian Federation. They still have huge signs up along their “borders” declaring as such. Even if they are often shot up or defaced. This may be an indicator of our feelings to come.
We headed back on ourselves and past the way we came in, ending up at a spot we had intended to go to on the first night. It was a secluded spot next to a river again but with only one other German couple around. It was so out of the way that you had to drive through a tunnel that was simply bare rock blasted through. No supports, no reinforcement, just bare rock barely wide enough for a vehicle, with huge boulders on the road that had clearly fallen off recently.
Thankfully we didn’t get buried under a mountain trying to get through, and we spent a couple of much needed chill out nights here. We even got the portable bbq out for the first time as the mists gathered across the icy river as the sun set. Funnily enough we were parked near a corn field and thought we were about to get in trouble when two guys just plowed across the front of the van, down toward us on the riverbank with our fire.
They got out and said something which obviously we didn’t understand. They then tried German (the main second language in the Balkans), which I at least understood that they were asking us if we were German. I said that we were British, English and they switched to a very broken English. Eventually we understood, they had been in the field either scrumping for corn or checking if it was ripe! They wanted to give us some of their haul for the fire and asked nothing in return. Phew, we thought that was going to go badly!
The corn was not ready by the way. But I tried it at least.
Next stop for us was a supermarket and then on via a town called Jajce. We were going to head to the waterfalls here but honestly we were already a bit out of our comfort zone here and couldn’t get too excited about it. We went into the larger supermarket for a few more bits and then hit the road toward Sarajevo instead.
This was a long day, 6 hours of driving, but we eventually made it into eastern Sarajevo, the old and still sort-of capital of Republic Srpska. There’s basically an internal border, a bit like the Welsh or Scottish border where it’s the same country as a whole, but separate at the same time. Except in the case of Scotland and Wales, they are actually recognised as countries in their own right. This border literally runs through part of the city and up the mountain overlooking the older part of Sarajevo, aka the actual capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
We continued through and up the mountain toward the ski lift and old Olympic bobsleigh track. We turned off and up a track to a brand new (3 weeks open) campsite that had been opened by a local woman and her family. It was beautifully looked after and had every amenity. She was very welcoming and you could tell they loved running the place and wanted it to be the best it could be.
We got a lot of laundry done here that evening and next morning. Then set off to catch the cable car down to the old city of Sarajevo.
The old city has recovered fairly well from the devastation of the war 30 years ago. However it does still bare its scars, almost with a sense of… well not pride, but more remembrance? To serve as a reminder perhaps? A most prominent and obvious symbol of this recovery is the old town hall. It was in use as a university library during the war when it was shelled with incendiary devices. As crews tried to save it the Republic Srpska troops continued to fire shells at it. Come the end of the war, the Austrian philharmonic was filmed playing a concert amongst the rubble of the central hall in remembrance.
Since then, the building, along with the city, has been slowly rebuilt. Serving as a symbol of the country’s rebuilding after such a bloody conflict. It was finally finished in 2014 and is truly a spectacular building.
The old town itself is a warren of bazaar-like streets filled with little cafes and shops just like you would see further east. The other notable mention should also be the location where Franz Ferdinand was shot, sparking the First World War. So we have now seen where it started as well as where it finished!
Leaving Sarajevo that evening, we headed south along tolls that disappeared into winding mountain roads. We wove through the mountains and past rivers and lakes full of plastic bottles and packaging. Dodging stray dogs in the road and playing chicken with lorries coming the opposite way in too narrow tunnels.
Stress levels were high by the time we reached our riverside park up just north of Mostar. Tensions were high between us as a result and we realised we needed a couple of days off again. This park up was lovely enough, despite the industrial site across the water in one direction, the view back toward the mountains to the north was rather nice. The river was still cold but nice for a quick swim (so Ellen said!). However the second night was pretty horrendous. A biblical storm smashed through the valley. We barely slept as Ellen worried about the river height, and the rain and wind battered the van.
Late the next morning it stopped and we got back on the road. We stopped at a big supermarket for a bit for some meetings, as a group of young 8-12 year old kids hung around the coaches we had parked next to. A couple were smoking of course. We didn’t feel too unsafe though as two EUFOR (the peace keeping force) trucks parked up next to us. So we felt it ok to go in and do some food shopping.
Next stop the famous Mostar. The sun was shining again and we walked into the old Ottoman town. Another sign of the division in this country, Mostar has two bus stations. One either side of the river and for each of the main ethnic groups here, god forbid they use the same one. Even though the same buses all go through both… go figure.
Mostar itself is famous with good reason, it truly is gorgeous and the waiter at the restaurant we went to for lunch did say this was a better time to come. Especially when just as we had finished our lunch looking over the river deep below us and the famous bridge over my shoulder, a mega storm rolled in again. “This is better, trust me. August is so busy and 45°”. Yeah fair enough mate, I’ll take a bit of rain!
They let us stay in the restaurant to have another drink and wait out the worst of the storm, then we headed out into the dying rains and across the bridge. The original ottoman bridge was destroyed during the war, but has been faithfully rebuilt. The dissipating rains also meant that a beautiful warm light was now shining across the city and reflecting off the wet roads, roofs and walls. So naturally I went a bit mad with the camera!
Heading out of Mostar we headed for a park up along a river just for a quick overnighter. But it had been blocked off and we had to quickly find another further down river. We managed to find one next to an abandoned beach bar, and even though a lot of the path was flooded and the river was rather high, we decided to brave it. A German family were already there and the Germans had now become our barometer for whether somewhere would be ok or not. The EU number plate with the country code “D” had now become a welcome sight whenever we were a little unsure of a location, and there are a lot of them around here!
**As an aside, the coffee has run out, it’s 1:30pm and 28°. It’s now beer o’clock and I’m moving down to a sunlounger…**
Anyway, the next morning the weather had vastly improved and we headed north west toward Kravice falls. We had been reccomended a campsite inside the park by Nick and Lex whom we had met up with in the Dolomites and they were not wrong. This was a lovely spot and I had a glass of wine with the very welcoming owner and a Swiss guy who has been vanlifing for 50 years!
We’re glad we had the campsite as we could again bust out the bbq, and then we, as the owner said, “can have big fire!” Also, turns out the falls were only a 5 minute walk away which was a blessing in disguise. The falls were HEAVING with people. Bars surround the basin and people were everywhere posing and queuing for instagram shots. We took a look, took some pics and headed back to the van. That’s not our bag. We did however head out that evening after our fire had died down, to see it at night. At night it is truly spectacular, and I’ll let the photos speak for themselves. Ellen, being an early bird, went the next morning and had it to herself, with added rainbows!
After a couple of nights here just chilling (literally in some cases, the river was freezing here too), we headed east toward Trebinjë. The road took us along tight tracks weaving through mountains and down onto highways which just disappeared into rocky, dusty tracks whilst the road was being built/maintained.
We pulled up and walked into the little town for lunch and a short wander before heading back to the van once more. Before we set off we realised the van next to us was the Swiss guy again! We had a lovely little chat with him and he showed us his map with his route plotted on it. What an awesome, adventurous life this guy must lead. We bid farewell and headed on into the eastern mountains and toward the border. Next stop, Montenegro!
**Another aside - be right back, gotta go swim! Another beer please waiter!**
Right where were we? Ah yes, heading into Montenegro!
We crossed through Bosnian Border control with a short wait and then up further through the high mountain pass toward Montenegrin Border control. Straight into a traffic jam. Ah, yes here we go, slow borders. It took an hour, with people trying to drive past everyone else in the queue and barge in, to a chorus of angry horns of course. Once we were through though it was plain sailing and we had a fairly warm welcome from the border guard. Good signs already Montenegro!
We had a park up chosen near the border as we knew it may take a while. We wound down a narrow track, the road got rougher and eventually we burst out onto a cliffside overlooking a huge lake and the mountains in south eastern Bosnia on the other side. What an absolutely amazing welcome. This country was already giving us better vibes than Bosnia had done, the sunset was absolutely epic! (I mean, look at the photos!)
The next morning we took a short walk to see the Red rock cave, which is currently being excavated or prepped for tourists, we’re not quite sure, and then hit the road north toward the Durmitor National Park.
Along the way we dropped into a huge basin in the centre of the country (it’s a third the size of Wales, so rather small) that had been partially flooded to serve as a reservoir. I slammed on the brakes and pulled into a very litter strewn lay-by overlooking the basin and sent up the drone for some epic photos (I hope, you can judge).
Heading on further, we made it into Durmitor and had our first taste of Google maps Balkans mismatch. The road just disappeared and we had to find a way round, then we got stuck in a weird traffic situation. Where a car in front was driving at 10kph in a 50 in a busy high street, the car behind us got annoyed and tried to overtake into oncoming traffic and swerved in between us and the slow car, then the slow car stopped in the middle of a junction for no apparent reason and we nearly had a pile-up. Ah, Balkans driving.
Anyway we made it to our campsite in the national park and then took a walk down to the “visitors centre”. Ellen was convinced we would get some useful information. I was not so sure. We had to climb over a fence to the centre, the lady was less than impressed that we had actually come in for any information and the info she gave Ellen was not helpful at all. I liked the 3D model of the park area in the next room though! 😅
We wandered back to the van and shooed off the limping stray dog that was trying to follow us back. He would be safer down the bottom. Ellen went off for a walk and I set up play some games and chill for the afternoon after another stressful drive.
The next morning we headed down to the Black lake for a 3 hour walk around the double lake system. As we passed the last campsite before entering the forest surrounding the lake, a medium sized foxy looking stray dog popped out from the campsite and started following us close behind.
At first we tried to discourage him, but he couldn’t be dissuaded. After another 15 minutes he was still following and then running ahead of us and waiting until we came to the first half of the black lake. We tried to figure out which way to go and this little dog was adamant that we should go right. We looked at the sign and realised he was correct, and we headed right around the lake.
As we walked this little stray dog kept running ahead, getting distracted by something and then would run back to us and follow keenly at our heels for a bit before repeating the cycle. We have started to want our own dog more and more as this year has progressed, and this little guy was not helping the matter. Ellen asked “what sort of name do you think he has?”
‘Oh God’, I thought, ‘we’re going to end up adopting a Montenegrin stray like you see some couples do online’. “I think he looks like a Max” she said, to which I replied “To be honest, I was thinking ‘stink’ so … stinky Max”.
Oh crap we named him.
After a while of him behaving exactly like a well trained pet dog on this walk I said “he doesn’t actually stink so that’s a bit unfair, just Max it is”
I swear, Max kept running off and just when we thought he had found someone else to follow, he came bounding back and carried on walking with us. Ok so I did then break and gave him a bit of a stroke, as did many other people we crossed to be fair. We sat at a bench and he came and sat between my legs too.
Oh for God’s sake, we must not adopt this stray!
Max continued on with us for 3/4 of the way round the lakes until he realised that other people actually had food for him and he finally ran down to the beach where a number of people were eating lunch and started begging for scraps. This distraction was too much for him and we never saw Max again. But, we made a fun friend who we got to spend a couple of hours wandering round with. Hopefully he’s still living his best life strolling around a beautiful national park in Montenegro.
Having left Max, we headed back to the campsite, had showers and hit the road again along the mountain track/path along the south of Durmitor and down into one of the river gorges on the other side. We turned south along the river gorge and continued onto the main highways across the city and toward Podgorica, the capital. At one point we hit more Balkan roadworks, similar to the last day in Bosnia. It seems they don’t close a lane and work on the other out here. They just dig up the whole road for miles at a time and let the traffic drive around the chaos. Imagine a major highway or motorway in your country and all the traffic it entails. Then imagine that instead of closing a lane or contra-flowing so everyone is still driving on tarmac, they just go “screw it” and dig it all up so you’re driving on unmarked dust and rock for miles at a time. Yeah it’s entertaining. Add to that, people driving on the smoothest part, even if it’s into oncoming traffic!
Anyway, entertaining drive. We got to Podgorica, the least inspiring capital city in Europe and turned right toward Cetinje. We were going to go to this city in a few days but we hit a road closure and standstill traffic. We were here for 2 and a half hours in the end. People were walking to a bar near the front and buying beers and I ended up making dinner in the van whilst we waited for it to be opened. Turned out there had been a landslide that morning and the whole area was closed. Thanks Google maps for not knowing about that either!
So, we changed tack as it was 8:30 by the time we got through. So we ended up in a park up behind the stadium in Cetinje instead of the mountains.
This was a blessing in disguise though as the next day we got to spend wandering Cetinje and visit the museums on a multi pass. Cetinje was the ancient royal capital on Montenegro and as all the guides will tell you, far more picturesque than the modern capital. We had a lovely day here exploring the museums that were open, including the worlds largest 3d model of an entire country. This was built by Montenegro’s best cartographer on the orders of the Austrian-Hungarian empire during their occupation in the First World War. We topped this off with an ok lunch accompanied by a nice Montenegrin red wine to add to my list.
We headed back to the van, did some food shopping at the supermarket over the road (and grabbed a bottle of said red wine) before setting off into the Lovçen national park to the south west and toward Kotor. We spent a couple of nights here in the peace and quiet high above everything. Ellen went for a walk up to the tomb of Njego, a revered leader of Montenegro, poignantly looking out from this highest peak across the whole country. Not even lying, you can see almost all of the country from up there!
The next day took us down the nerve wracking and aptly named “Serpentine” road, down from Lovçen and into the ancient town of Kotor. What a lovely town this was and we were finally back at the coast. Well sort of, it’s a cove or I suppose more of a fjord that leads to the sea. Unfortunately this means that floating blocks of council flats could moor up. Oh sorry, they’re technically called ‘Cruise ships’ aren’t they?
Horrid things.
Well, what a gorgeous old town, we wandered around, ate some lovely lunch, battled crowds of ‘cruiseys’, visited the maritime museum (woohoo boats!) and finished with a lovely drink at a rooftop terrace with a great view in one direction and in the other, the slab sided, featureless void of Viking cruise’s floating tenement building. Shame. Despite that, we enjoyed it so much that after returning to the van for dinner, and saying a surprised hello to the Brits who had parked next to us at the beachside camper-stop, we wandered back into the town for drinks at various bars in the old town. Our favourite being the smooth jazz club right in the centre.
We liked Montenegro and Kotor just cemented this for us.
The next morning we headed off, after a couple of false starts thanks to Google and closed roads, and headed south east along the coast. A minor incident involving Ellen clipping someone’s windmirror en-route but overall a nice drive. We pulled up a steep and tight track to a viewpoint just south of Budvar to look out over the little islet town of Sveti Stefan for a rest and to see this wonderful little spot that we had seen both Nick and Lex at BubblesTheCampervan and Katie at DippyVanGram Had swung by.
We hit the road again and finally reached a beach park up just past Ulcinj and not far from the border. Here we parked up near the beach away from everyone, finally in a flat place with easy access to the beach in this otherwise very mountainous country. We debated staying here a second night but ultimately decided to head on in the afternoon after a day on the beach.
**Aside - one more beer waiter! It’s still hot here on my beach lounger in Greece!**
We stopped by a supermarket for some supplies and fuel as we knew these would be either hard to come by or expensive in Albania. (We were subsequently right and never stopped for either in Albania itself) Then onward to the Albanian Border. This was yet again another long wait and when we did make it to the border, we had our passports briefly looked at, some stuff scribbled down on a notepad and then waved on. No stamp out of Montenegro, no stamp into Albania, nothing…
The border guy said it’s all good and said the insurance green card booth is 300m down on the right hand side. Great… ok… we pulled up just after the border and walked back. A border guard waved us over and we asked him what was going on. It turns out Albania just does their land border by checking the number of people in the vehicle and the registration, then putting it on an electronic system. No scanning or stamping. Yeah we had no idea if this would work but the internet also agreed with this. We weren’t the only ones either, two German (or Austrian) guys had also walked back and asked us if we had gotten any answers. So we explained and we agreed that it must be ok.
Next stop was a dodgy lean-to shack 200m further to buy “insurance” for €90. Honestly, I doubt it would have paid out had there been any incidents, and there wasn’t even any info on who to contact if there were, but we had a fancy green slip of paper… soooo…
We weren't hugely impressed with Albania, as is apparent by the lack of photos from the first 5 days in the country, and as I hope to explain...
We pushed on, and because everyone had said Lake Shkoder was amazing we ignored the sat nav and took a quick detour up through some shanty town slums to look at the lake. Ok yeah, it’s huge and cool but we didn’t have time to do much else, plus the vibe here was already off compared to Montenegro!
We got back on track, back through the shanty town, back on the main road which even a local British council say “Oh, ok yeah that probably could do with repairing” to and then onto a long back road which said British council actually wouldn’t stand for (I know, THAT bad!) until we eventually came to the campsite we had found literally On the other side of the headland we had been parked near in Montenegro!
That said this campsite was fantastic, we had a lively welcome from the amazing owners who helped us top
up the water tanks. They had laundry and clean solar heated showers and a restaurant next door that did some awesome pizzas as we found that evening. They even had some homemade crafts for sale and an honour system bar where you wrote your pitch number and what you had taken on a pad and they charged you for everything at the end. Bloody brilliant, even if a tad pricey compare for what we were used to, but it was close to the beach and very well looked after. Get hold of us on Instagram or otherwise and I will gladly give you the location!
We ended up here for two nights rather than the intended one as it was so nice, even with the walk to the beach and said beach being as covered in litter as every other Balkans beach. On the final day we got topped up, had ANOTHER shower, three in three days, oh my god, that’s heaven to a vanlifer! (Even with an onboard shower you have to alternate days) Then bidding fairwell, we hit the crazy roads once again.
**Aside - is another beer too excessive? It’s now 4:30pm and not cooling down at this beach bar in Greece. Nah!**
Back on the road in Albania, we were now heading back up the questionable road toward the “main roads”. We turned right onto something resembling a motorway and were headed toward Tiranë, the capital. We had heard it was lively and worth a visit and so had found an aire in the north of the city with good access.
A few hours of dodging dodgy driving and 100% not stolen cars with mainly UK and a couple of Texas licence plates with an Albanian sticker plastered over the U. K. And Texas bits (I kid you not) later and we got to the Tiranë traffic. Oh my god, lane discipline does not exist in Albania, two lanes? Nah can fit three cars down that until it veers off the road into a ditch that is now one lane but wide enough for two.
Then we got into Tiranë centre, Google tells us to turn right into what is now a highway wall. Crap, well, we’ll follow this motorway round a bit, turn off here and head back, come on sense of direction don’t fail me now.
Well, my sense of direction may not have failed me, but the ability to find a coherent road into the northern part of town completely eluded me. I started to lose it a bit I’m not going to lie. We ended up down a narrow track right next to the motorway, a supermarket car park to the left, a big block of a building for I think a mechanics shop to the right and cars parked either side of the road. It was tight even for a small car let alone our massive van. Yet still some dude saw us, waited and then decided he would try and come down the opposite way on his moped and then get annoyed that we were there and he had to pull in between cars. Eurgh.
I had had enough. I pulled into the petrol station on the side of the highway on the middle of Tiranë just after this and said to Ellen “I’m just f-ing done” to which she agreed and said “what do you need me to do? Find a place to go or just find a place to get us away from here to decide?”, “either, I will be ok to drive, but just to get us out of this f-ing city!”
Our opinions about Albania were rather sullied by this experience for a while it has to be said. Dodgy google maps, we can cope with. Dodgy driving we can cope with. Crappy roads we can cope with. All three in unison and a constant awareness that your insurance is at best an expensive piece of paper and the stress levels are dialled up to 12! (Yes Spinal Tap, there’s a number even higher than 11!)
We got the hell out of there and on a bearing toward a spot Ellen had found near the coast we pulled off the motorway into a petrol station to make some lunch and calm down a bit more. Obviously the owners didn’t like us stopping here in this completely empty forecourt and moved us to a tiny strip of hard shoulder just beyond which was totally 100% safe. Then Ellen took the wheel and we headed to the coast.
We made it to the coast and just up from a resort “town” if you can call it that. After messing about finding somewhere that wasn’t covered in litter or deep in trees neighbouring a lean-to, we found a little place. It had a decent amount of shade from the heat, yet afternoon sun for the solar and it was no more than 20m from the beach and parked up. Best of all, there was another self build near us with the now comforting “D” on the number plate. “Ah it’s ok, there are some Germans here”.
All jokes aside, our German brothers and sisters do have some rather high standards from what we have seen, so if it’s alright for them, it’s alright for us!
We were going to spend one night here and maybe head inland and see some of the country, but after a day on the beach we realised that we were in need of a break and stayed a second night. Ellen did some meetings the next morning and I wandered down the beach front to find a bar that hadn’t closed for the season on the Monday (the day we arrived) and was even cleaning their patch of beach around their campsite and beach loungers! I wandered back to the van as Ellen finished her meeting just after lunch and I just said “I don’t really want to leave”. Turns out she was relieved as she didn’t really want to either. We hadn’t really felt this chill and close to the sea since Tarifa in southern Spain back in late March!
We wandered back to the beach bar and had a few drinks as the wind picked up and the weather rolled in then headed back to the van for some leftover veggie chilli from the night before. Remember I said we had managed not to shop or fuel up in Albania? We had made sure we had plenty of tinned goods back in Slovenia and had made a bean chilli the night before so we were sorted.
That night was pretty brutal though.
It started off hot and sweaty as hell, we had been eaten alive by mosquitos the last few nights and tonight was a little better thanks to the wind and some vigilance on our part. However, around 1am, just as it normally cools down and we can close the windows and pull the duvet over, another epic storm rolled in across the Adriatic. The van shook and the pounding rain on the metal roof woke us up and kept us up for a good few hours.
The next morning though, blinding sunshine! The only evidence of the storm was the wet sand and puddles around the gravel we had parked on.
Ellen headed out onto the beach for a bit whilst I jumped on a meeting with my therapist for a bit of a download on the stressful events of the last two weeks… well mainly Tiranë let’s be honest!
Whilst we could have easily stayed yet another night we hit the road again, fully refreshed and chilled to the dulcet tones of Tom Cardy.
Maybe look up said Aussie Troubadour for a sense of our jubilant mood…
We were back on the crazy roads of Albania, fully refreshed, relaxed, and ready to face the chaos! We headed south, the roads became windier, the roads became weirdly smoother, the stray dogs stayed just as prevalent.
Until we ended up in a vast mountainous region with still weirdly smooth roads. Ok, maybe we judged the country too harshly based on the north. (Insert English joke about the same being true of our north? Maybe don’t open that can of worms Tom!)
Then we hit our little park up in Gjirokaster. Not much to look at, but we were welcomed by a lively chap who approached the correct side of the van and asked “whereabouts are you from in the U. K?” Having seen our U. K. Plate. Immediately we knew this guy spoke British English very well. “Whereabouts” is, as we have learned, very much a British idiom.
Yep, he explained he had lived in Leeds for a time and we had a good little chat with him and he gave us a safe route to get into the old city and gave us a recommendation for dinner.
We spent that afternoon in the old city of Gjirokaster, hanging about its old Bazaar and up in the castle before hitting a rooftop bar to see the insane sunset streaking across the mountainous valley below. We then headed to the recommended restaurant and as it was the most popular spot in town (having been there since 1720!) we had a bit of a wait. Unfortunately my starter did include undercooked sausage, but I was ok and I’ll let it slide as the rest of the food was great. Though tbh, a starter wasn’t needed with the traditional “degustation” mix in all honesty.
After dinner we headed back along the long but safe route recommended and hit the hay back in the van.
This was definitely a good way to end our time in Albania as in all honesty a few days prior we were very much ready to end it early and take the hit on Schengen days by heading to Greece early. We’re glad we didn’t despite the sausage situation. (I was fine, iron stomach over here dealt with the raw Albanian pork… which probably says a lot about the American beef mince situation in Texas in January… look back for the details on that one…)
The next day… well, that was today! We wove through the mountains and a very fume filled tunnel (Honestly we had the fog lights on and t-shirts around faces) and down to the southern border. It was time to head back into our beloved EU and the known entity that is Greece.
The border was an easy crossing as we hit it so early in the morning and then 5 minutes down the road we pulled into this beach bar and… well you know the rest, though I’m a few beers deep at this point and probably don’t know myself!
Oh, and we are being joined by our friend Corin on Sunday to go Sailing round the Ionian!
